Family law insights and commentary from the offices of divorce and family law attorney Simon Dippenaar.
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Government pension fund members will no longer accrue pension debt after a divorce settlement payout We’ve written about divorce and pension sharing recently. It can be the most contentious aspect of a divorce, particularly where one partner is a high earner and the pension fund represents a significant asset. It can be particularly emotive because, […]
It’s complicated: Why more and more tech start-up founders are demanding prenups Young couples contemplating marriage often think of antenuptial contracts, or “prenups“, as something either for their wealthy counterparts or for second marriages, when each partner is bringing a history of asset accumulation to the marriage. In the first flush of love, couples often […]
Most victims of sexual assault know their attackers…and it often starts insidiously Along with the rest of the country, we at SD Law were outraged and heartbroken by the spate of violent attacks on women that marked this past winter. Although assaults by strangers do happen, in the vast majority of cases, the victim knows […]
A parenting plan records the parents’ agreement, but the child’s best interests remain paramount. Here is what parents may decide, what a court must test, and how a plan may be changed.
What young people say helped them get through their parents’ divorce When parents separate or get divorced, it inevitably disrupts the lives of children, and can take a toll on their mental well-being. Over time, children learn to accommodate the changes – some more successfully than others. Parents often worry about how best to support […]
This Marriage Week, we look at how a postnuptial contract can strengthen marriage We recently wrote about the vexed issue of divorce and pensions. After the marital home, the pension is often the biggest asset to divide and the one that can cause the most contention, usually because it is the direct result of one […]
Interim maintenance can be a saving grace. Don’t let it become a weapon. Have you heard of a Rule 43 application? If you’re going through a divorce, chances are that you have. According to Stats SA, in 2016 there were 25,326 divorce court orders, and most of them involved an application for an interim maintenance […]
Asset splitting on divorce includes pensions – or does it? There is probably no aspect of divorce more complex and contentious than the division of pension entitlement. Despite the introduction of “clean-break” legislation in 2007 by amendments to the Pension Funds Act 24 of 1956 (PFA), fair and equitable sharing of pension fund assets is […]
